90% True

.: Television cameras add approximately ten pounds to a person’s body. If depression could be quantified by a metric similar to weight, then cameras have the opposite effect on the city of Slough. Slough was the setting for The Office, a comedy of complementary bleakness; the cameras were too kind.

Here’s a picture of something more pleasing to the eye than Slough: a foot-shaped urine stain.

.: A quick survey of the city — all that we got and more than we wanted — revealed architecture cursed with the worst kind of ugly. Imagine the underside of a concrete bridge so horrifyingly foul neither bats nor hobos dare live there. Now picture that surface on the side of an office complex built in the seventies. That’s Slough.

.: Luckily, we never left the train; we were going to Oxford. Oscar needed a replacement t-shirt from an Oxford bookstore, which took about ten minutes. We had some time to kill. Aside from seeing a few nice museums (one of which we accidentally stumbled into without paying), trekking through a garden spoiled by a restrictive tradition, and having Oscar take a delightful photograph of me in Trinity Chapel, nothing of note happened.

.: Our next stop was Stratford-upon-Avon. Since I’m American, I tend to think of England as no larger than Delaware. As such, I figured the train ride would only take about 45 minutes. In fact, England is about the size of Connecticut, so the train ride took about twice as long. On the way I felt a bump on my lip, right where I received the scratch back in Part Four. I was developing a cold sore.

.: One of life’s many pleasures is not experiencing a cold sore. Whenever I don’t have one I am happy. Whenever I do have one, I’m told to eat foods high in lysine (yogurt, beets, whey — yuck) and avoid foods high in arginine (cashews, orange juice, blackberries — yum!), and this only further contributes towards my sour disposition.

.: The ride was only halfway finished when I felt the tingling, and I knew I needed some acyclovir soon or the bastard would rupture. Oscar, I, and my throbbing lip arrived at Stratford-upon-Avon and set out immediately for a pharmacy, but this was England and convenience stops at 5:00. To add insult to very-soon-to-be injury, the only reason to visit Stratford-upon-Avon was closed. We waited an hour for the next train to London, unburdened by happy thoughts.

“You have a crystalline growth on your lip, Cody.”

An artist’s reconstruction of the culprit and alleged crime. Drawing credit: Diego

.: Shit. That meant it had emerged and was seeping plasma, platelets, and little tiny instructions for making copies of itself. Gross. Had I applied some acyclovir before the virus progressed to ape-shit exponential levels, I could have prevented it from rearing its ugly head altogether.

.: We arrived in London at 11:13pm, and the nearest pharmacy closed at 11:00pm. (I’m not sure it would have done me any good were it open since I didn’t have a prescription.) We searched the over-the-counter medicines for the wussy alternatives, and Oscar spotted a tube of Zivorax. Main ingredient? Acyclovir. What’s more, it was only £5 — much cheaper than it would be in America even with insurance.

.: So the day wasn’t a total wash, except the cold sore ruptured anyway, meaning any romantic aspirations for the remainder of the trip were shot to shit.

Next: an abusive American diner, the complete works of William Shakespeare, and other things that have slowly slipped away since I never bothered writing them down until now.
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six | Part Seven

.: In my twenty-one years of experience as a dedicated food eater, I’ve noticed a standard protocol which every American restaurant follows religiously:

1. You enter the establishment.
2. The hostess smiles and leads you to your table.
3. The waiter asks what you’d like to drink.
4. The waiter returns promptly with your drink.
5. The waiter asks what you’d like to eat.
6. The waiter returns with your food as soon as it’s ready.
7. The waiter periodically refills your drink.
8. You signify when you are done by resting the cutlery on your plate.
9. The waiter takes your dishes away and returns with the check.
10. You evaluate the waiter’s performance and tip accordingly.
11. You leave the establishment, proud to be an American.

.: Deviations abound per local flavors, but the basic form is found everywhere in the United States.

.: London restaurants, in contrast, operate on an altogether different principle, which is to say none at all. You enter a restaurant, which you realize on closer inspection is actually a pub. They serve food there, but you’re not sure you want it. You sit patiently, foolishly expecting someone to come take your order. Later, you approach the bar and wait for the bartender to acknowledge you. You stand two feet from him and think he sees you, but he doesn’t. Eventually you learn you must stare intensely into his eyes before he accepts your existence. You order your drink and meal together, and he leaves to make your drink, forgetting to write down the second half of your order. He somehow delivers your drink without noticing you, and you start the whole process of getting his attention over again. (Or you could be like the seasoned local who slams his body against the counter and yells, “Two pints of Guinness, mate!”) You finally order the rest of your meal, and your bill is somewhere north of £10. You try to pay with a £50 note, and the bartender, annoyed by an utterly illusory inconvenience, asks if you have anything smaller. You say no, this is all you’ve got. He snatches the note from your hand and effortlessly makes exact change. You wonder what the fuss was about, sit down, and eat your food one hour later when it arrives. Your final disappointment comes when you realize the staff doesn’t expect to be tipped, so you can’t leave a $.13 “Fuck You” tip as a commentary on their service. Or your experience could be nothing like that — there’s really no telling since there’s no consistent, inter-restaurantal service protocol in London.

.: Oscar and I avoided those hassles by ordering pizza at an Italian restaurant. Europeans invented the familiar cutlery we used today, so it’s somewhat understandable that they would use it for everything.* I believe one of the Treaties of Paris stipulated that pizza should henceforth be consumed with one’s hands, but Europeans are nothing if not adamant in their backwards, counter-intuitive, anti-obviously-the- correct-manner-to-eat-certain-food ways. Forks are simply ineffective against flatten foods. Pizza should be sliced before served, and each slice should be cradled by one’s fingers in that familiar, satisfying fashion. There’s no shame in touching your food.

“On our trip to England I noticed something obscene/People still actually give a shit about the Queen”

.: We stumbled into an inviting pub after visiting Windsor Castle (summary: The Queen is extravagantly wealthy for no good reasons and a single exceptionally bad one: her ancestors convinced an entire nation that the monarchy was divinely mandated by Lord Jesus God Ghost himself). The pub was the kind of place with menus and silverware on the tables, so we assumed there were servers who would come take our order. We waited patiently until an employee corrected us, “You have to order up here at the counter.” Once there, I asked for fish ‘n’ chips and a lemonade. The employee informed me that drink orders must be placed at the bar. I paid for my fish ‘n’ chips (”You don’t have anything smaller than a £20?”) and told the nice gal behind the bar that I would like a lemonade. We Americans may have our many faults as a society, but one thing we don’t do is charge £4.30 for a scant 20 centiliters of soft drink. “Lemonade”, by the way, is English for “Sprite”.

.: I sat back down at the table just as Oscar left to make his order. He returned several minutes later with two dark drinks in his hands and a ghostly look on his face. “I just wanted a tea,” he whispered. “Tea” in English apparently means “Pimms & Lemonade and a pint of Guinness”. Twelve minutes had passed, and in that time I amazed myself with my superhuman ability to consume all three sips of my drink. Consequently, I was without liquid refreshment, so his ordering mishap seemed to work well in my favor.

Anybody who wants to see me drink will have to take me to London.

.: I say “seemed to” because I actually strongly dislike the smell and flavor of nearly all alcoholic drinks. I sampled the Pimms & Lemonade Sprite and enjoyed it precisely because it did not taste like alcohol. Oscar enjoyed it too, which meant I got the pint of Guinness.

.: Bitter, bland, flat, gross, and nauseating are adjectives I reserve for superior flavors (like pickle juice and vomit). Bath water has better aftertaste. Why anyone would willingly imbibe a concoction this terrible is no mystery to me: there’s alcohol in it; who cares if it’s any good! I downed five sips in fifteen minutes before giving up:

[Update: commenter Josh tells me this is Bitter, not Guinness.]

.: We went to another pub for dinner where I nearly had to slap the bartender to get his attention. “Pimms & Lemonade,” Oscar and I both said. Oscar ordered the Mash & Sausage with no gravy. I tried to follow with an order of Chicken Kiev, but the bartender interrupted me, “Together or separate?” I didn’t know if he was referring to the payment scheme or if he wanted to know whether we wanted the drink and meal brought to us simultaneously. “Together,” I responded. I paid for Oscar’s food and drink, but the bartender scampered off before I could finish my order. He returned with Oscar’s Pimms & Lemonade, clearly saw my fingers cocked in the “Excuse me, I would like your attention” position, and promptly vanished.

.: Another bartender appeared and told me to order with the other people at the opposite end of the room. I wound up waiting ten minutes and decided it would be best to order only the drink; food could be found elsewhere.

.: However, I still had to wait for Oscar’s food. “Wait” is a somewhat subjective term. It can mean different things to different people. When a friend pulls up to a gas station and says “Wait here,” you can expect to see him again in a few minutes. When a doctor says you’ll have to wait for the results, he probably has in mind a few weeks. For our purposes, we shall use “wait” in the sense with which geologists are familiar. Oscar and I waited.

Oscar struggles diligently to free his fork from the sausage.

.: A family sat down at a nearby table a good twenty minutes into our wait, and their food arrived before Oscar’s (this was a common theme throughout the entire trip). While my hypothesis must forever remain speculation, I suspect the blame for the long wait can be assigned to the complicated nature of the dish. Not only did the chef have to squeeze all the flavor and juices from the sausages, he also had to delicately arrange them in a bed of mash potatoes. That, at least, would account for the first half hour. He must have spent the remaining twenty minutes meticulously applying the gravy Oscar specifically did not request.

.: To call the meal “food” would devalue the word of meaning. Oscar’s plate overflowed with stuff utterly inedible to everything except certain species of archaebacteria. The knife and fork team proved wholly inadequate, and his teeth went on strike after a few strenuous bites. I still have thoughts of the Chicken Kiev and cringe at what could’ve been.

.: Still hungry, we wandered into a place called Garfunkel’s. A nice lady at the front door led us to our booth and handed us menus. A few seconds later she returned, ready to take our drink order. “Tap water?” she repeated after me. I nodded. “Would you like ice with that?” We only got dessert, and it was overpriced, but fewer times have I appreciated the existence (if not necessarily the quality) of warm apple pie nestled next to a scoop of vanilla ice cream. We left her nice tip.

Next: A trip to Oxford, another famous house, and a depressing city
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

.: Yesterday was supposed to be Darwin Day, but we failed to realize, foolish American we were, just how long British distances can be. The 16 miles from London to Downe is actually equivalent to 130 American miles. I’d like to snatch a Briton from a pub, show him a map of Texas, and watch him snort uncontrollably when I tell him I can get from Waco to Austin in under 2 hours. “Ninety-nine miles?!” he’ll guffaw. “Naw, that’ll take you all day, it will.”

.: Factoring all the time we spent waiting for the bus to arrive to take us to Downe, actually driving to Downe, getting lost in Downe, waiting for the bus to arrive to take us from Downe, and actually driving from Downe meant we weren’t going anywhere else that day. That’s not to say that we couldn’t safely go elsewhere, but British people have this perversely ubiquitous notion that everything of interest outside of one’s home should cease at 5:00, and they close their stores accordingly.

.: So today would have to be the exciting conclusion to Darwin Day. Our first stop was the Natural History Museum. Founded in the 19th century as an extension of the British Museum, the Natural History Museum is another example of a building which deserves a museum of its own.

.: A large casting of a diplodocus skeleton greets everyone at the entrance, a sight which I’m sure brings out the inner-paleontologist in everyone. Behind the diplodocus stands a statue of Richard Owen atop a splendid staircase. You might not have heard of him, but you’ve definitely used a word he coined (it rhymes with “binosaur”). Additionally, he is allegedly the only person Darwin ever hated.

.: Like every good museum should, this one let us take pictures. I believe they also permitted flash — nobody stopped us, anyway — but every picture taken of an object behind glass suffered from a phenomenon optical physicists call “reflection”. Without flash, each picture had a quality most professional photographers describe as “blurry”. We strolled leisurely through a hall of gemstones and minerals taking such pictures, but our pace increased somewhat towards the end (you’ve seen one thorium silicate, you’ve seen ‘em all).

.: One spectacularly — and unexpectedly, considering Owen’s legacy — pitiful exhibit was on Dinosaurs. I must have missed the “appropriate for ages 6-12″ sign, because this exhibit sucked. Animatronic dinosaurs belong in creation museums (which don’t belong anywhere), not real museums. Oscar’s allergies disagreed almost instantly with the atmosphere. Unfortunately, the crowd was too thick to walk past. I only had to suffer the aesthetics; poor Oscar had to witness the miserable display and gasp for every breath through a shrinking windpipe.

.: We eventually escaped and headed toward the gift shop. I read somewhere (I think in Bill Bryson’s A Short History of Nearly Everything) that Owen’s last triumph over Darwin was the superior positioning of his own statue. The second thing you see in the museum (right after diplodocus) is Owen himself in majestic bronze form. Darwin’s statue, I had read, was relegated to a small corner in the gift shop. We searched the shop fruitlessly until Oscar asked an employee where we could find it.

“Oh no, it’s in the cafe.”

.: It’s an impressive statue (so is Huxley’s to his right), but I’m afraid Owen’s wins on location alone. Still, Darwin ultimately won where it mattered: he was right. Also, in a less-than-ultimate-but-still- worthy-of-mentioning victory, the museum now sports an add-on Darwin Centre.

.: The last picture I took before leaving the museum was a shot of Prof. Steve Steve’s close relative. Short digression: Once when Oscar and I regularly attended College Bowl practice, the professor asked a question that I answered with unprecedented alacrity. “This animal’s enlarged radial sesa–” was as far as he got before I buzzed in.

“Giant Panda!” (I never got many history or literature questions, but I nailed the sciences.)

.: Giant Pandas, you see, have a fake thumb: an enlarged radial sesamoid bone. I can’t pretend to explain it better than Stephen Jay Gould, so check out The Panda’s Thumb from the library, or just read it here. [/digression]

.: The next and final stop for our Darwin Day festivities was Westminster Abbey. The Abbey is terrifyingly awesome at first. Famous dead people surrounded me wherever I stepped — people whose existence were responsible for so many chapters in my history and literature books. For goodness’ sake, I saw the tomb of Geoffrey Chaucer. He died, like, 600 years ago! But the more I wandered, the more I thought, “These aren’t people worthy of my wonder. Most of them were rich kooks with crazy ideas. The few genuinely remarkable persons, like Newton, Lyell, Darwin, and Chaucer were overshadowed and overcrowded by various Lords, Dukes, and other veritable dickwads who no more deserved their place in history than the next guy, save for the positively insane notion of hereditary titles.

“Look, the tomb of Lord Billowsly Fartswottle. What did he do? Oh, he killed people in a forgotten and cosmically insignificant battle several centuries ago.”

.: If I sound bitter, it’s not because of the half-assedly researched reasons I’ve just listed. I’m really just peeved that some of these people have graves that cost more than all the houses I’ve ever stepped into combined. I’m also pissed that they wouldn’t allow pictures. Why the hell not? Do they think flash photography degrades grave markers worse than shoes? Do they think photography bothers other visitors, even without flash? And what’s with charging visitors £13? I suppose that doesn’t matter too much, since I only wanted a single picture of Darwin’s grave. Alas, “spartan” is too flowery a word to describe his marker:

.: I’m surprised they went to such extravagant lengths to include his middle name. Charles Lyell got a nice write-up, and his ideas are just as offensive to crude religious sensitivities as Darwin’s. (Newton’s monumental grave has marble angels all over it, but that’s somewhat proportional to his feats.) It’s as if the people who buried Darwin recognized his stature but didn’t approve of his accomplishments.

.: After Westminster, I got a chance to take the usual touristy pictures: Big Ben, The Eye, London Bridge Tower Bridge. Since you are reading this, you have obviously been exposed to the internet. It is therefore likely that you are familiar with a great many other things, like the rest of the world and its many famous landmarks. Thus, no more need be said of these topics, except for the one I’m about to talk about.

.: Imagine a thousand-year-old amusement park with no rides and a priceless collection of jewels you can only see for a few seconds by standing on a conveyor belt, and you’ve got the Tower of London. I’m sure it wasn’t always like this, but modernization of historical landmarks always seems to be for the worse. The only worthwhile anecdote I have about the Tower of London involves the torture room. Before you enter the room, you’re presented with a question: Do you think it’s right to torture prisoners? There were three options: Yes, No, and Sometimes. Yes and Sometimes together received nearly 20,000 more votes than No. I don’t see why Bush repeatedly insists the government doesn’t torture — apparently most people are fine with it.

.: It was still sunny and quite beautiful outside, which meant the Tower was closing in a few minutes. We made a mad rush to see something so wholly unremarkable that I forgot what it was. Soon they stopped admitting people into the exhibits and we left. If you ever find yourself in England with an urge to visit the Tower of London, suppress it. For the price of one ticket you can buy three or four cones of ice cream instead. There’s a nice gelato shop right next to the place that serves delicious chocolate. It’s less historical, certainly, but far more satisfying.

.: Since higher entertainment ends three hours before sundown, lower entertain must be found on the streets. Oscar and I hopped on a bus to Covent Garden. If you’re into dudes who hurl several sharp objects into the air and catch them all at once, then I know of no better place. If, while watching people hurl and catch sharp objects, you wish to snack on gelato that costs £5 per spoonful, then you’re an idiot, because that’s way too much for gelato.

.: One of the performers clad only in his underwear — there were several such people — juggled a live chainsaw as part of his act. Several frat boys (I’m told they’re called “punters” over here, but a cursory Google search reveals little) disrupted his show several times from a balcony. Clearly they hoped to see him drop the chainsaw on himself. The disgust I felt at these punters was matched only by my desire to see the performer drop the saw on himself.

.: The show ended with the performer’s limbs still attached, and the onlookers dispersed. Oscar and I noticed a smaller crowd gathering at a nearby T-intersection. One thing you don’t often see in London is a large SUV — doubly true if it’s stretched. When you do see one, its presence alone does not usually warrant rubbernecking. Even a stretched SUV is an oddity that no longer surprises passersby. But when one of them can’t make a turn on an otherwise wide corner and consequently blocks a heavily trafficked street, a throng tends to gather.

.: Inside one such limousine/SUV hybrid, a gaggle of young Pakistani girls celebrated a sweet 16 or 17 or 18 or whatever age in Pakistani culture represents the passage of a young girl into Conspicuous Consumption-hood. However old they were, one of them rolled down the window and flashed her chest. This drew the attention of the punters from before, and one of them managed to thrust his arm inside the vehicle before the girl could close the window. Maybe I’m not familiar with the ways of London, but can’t a girl cheerfully display her breasts without being hassled by drunk males? Her actions didn’t say, “Hey, come over here so you can feel these!” Rather, she clearly meant to express, “I’m so unbelievably drunk that I can publicly expose my body and later force myself to pretend I never did!” Guys, that kind of gesture is not an invitation to touch.

.: One 27-point turn later, and with mere millimeters to spare, the stretched SUV slowly crept past the obstructing pillar responsible for the traffic clog and sped away into the night, stopping about two blocks down the road to unload its party. I can’t remember for certain, but I feel as if the punters found them again.

.: A funny thing happened on the tube: another gaggle of boisterous women (considerably older than the last) converged in our subway car. The most intoxicated of the bunch spotted two Italians, one of which carried a guitar.

“Play us a song!” she burped.

.: The Italians were quiet and reserved; the woman was not. One of them must have silently calculated how quieter the tube would be if they simply played a song than if they let her continue to bug them to play one. And so they did:

Next: Visiting the exorbitant home of a useless figurehead, ordering awful food, and trying my first pint!
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

.: Earlier in the day we stopped by a bookstore and purchased half a dozen books between the two of us (at surprisingly reasonable prices, even factoring in the exchange rate). Oscar also bought two souvenir guidebooks and a book about Christ at the British Museum. We never returned to the hotel and subsequently had to carry our ever-growing burden wherever we went.

.: Eventually we consolidated everything into the museum bag. This meant, given any moment, one of us was happy while the other had a sore shoulder. We quickly developed schemes to shift the sack from one to the other. A common tactic involved buying a drink and asking the other person to hold the bag while unscrewing the cap. This was my favored method. Not only would I no longer have the bag, but I’d also get a refreshing drink out of the deal.

.: Another equally effective approach took advantage of the numerous photo opportunities. You couldn’t very well take a steady picture with a heavy bag weighing down one of your hands; simply pass the bag to the other guy and take the shot from every attainable angle, making sure to be as meticulous and time-consuming as possible with each framing. Twenty shots later and he’ll likely have forgotten that he agreed to hang on to the bag for “just a second.” And so we swapped the entire trip to Downe.

.: So what would bring two young science majors a young science major and a slightly younger psychology major to a small, obscure English village? There’s not much there. It has two pubs on the same block, cozy flats, and equally cozy black cars. But there is something there of international interest: Down House, the home of England’s most famous and influential invalid: Charles Darwin.

.: We hopped off at the town’s only bus stop and quickly found our bearings. We located a historical marker pointing towards the house, followed its helpful advice, and soon found ourselves at another sign pointing towards the house, only it didn’t. Rather, it pointed towards a driveway, which led to a cottage called Lilac. Lilac is in no way similar to Down; the names share no sounds, syllables, or letters.

“It’s definitely pointing to the driveway,” I told Oscar. (See here for photographic evidence.)

“Maybe it means the left up ahead?”

“But the road curves, it doesn’t actually make a left turn. It should just point up if that’s the case.”

.: Oscar eventually persuaded me and we walked up the curved road. The sidewalk quickly terminated, and we turned around. We asked a passing local how to get to the house, and he pointed back towards the confusing sign and said, “Just go back there, take a left.” Understand, we were walking back to the sign at this point, so the man was telling us to go the opposite direction indicated by the sign. We reappeared before the sign and immediately dismissed his counterintuitive and nonsensical directions.

“It is definitely pointing that way,” I said, arm gesticulating towards the driveway.

“Maybe it means this way?”

.: To the left of the gravel driveway appeared to be a second grass driveway. It looked like private property, but it was in fact a public walkway. (I should note that while walking this path we encountered our first noisome bugs in England.) We trekked a few meters until we reached the barbed wire fence and “Danger Of Death” sign. We returned to the puzzling sign once more and reconsidered the local’s directions.

“There’s a trail over there,” I beckoned to the right. And so, British museum bag in hand, we embarked on a short-lived journey through the passageway on the right. Doubts emerged. It seemed implausible that the footpath to Down house would be dark, narrow, lined with poisonous plants, and blocked by this fence:

.: But this is England, I reminded myself, and things are done differently here. Maybe the gate was a precautionary measure designed to keep out the occasional unwanted fundamentalist protester, who would invariably be an elderly person and thus unable to surmount it? Though I had seriously entertained that idea for nearly two seconds, my more rational side eventually convinced me that we were not where we were supposed to be.

.: We marched back to the sign, and at least one of us took the time to quietly beseech the gods to smite or otherwise seriously harm the unhelpful (and unpleasant looking, I’ve now decided) local who gave us the bad directions.

“Maybe it’s not a driveway.”

“I don’t think that’s the way,” Oscar correctly responded.

.: I was partially correct: it was also a parking lot. Back to the sign. Oscar wanted to try the public pathway again. When you’ve exhausted every option, your only choice is to repeat them.

.: We ventured pass the barbed wire and danger sign and carefully maneuvered around exposed roots and various animal droppings. I believe I was carrying the museum bag at this point, because I somehow managed to scratch my lip with it (more on that in a later post).

.: We glimpsed decrepit tool sheds filled with antiquarian farm equipment clearly still in use, which was not out of place at all because we were walking through a farm. Mind you, Down House is not an obscure curiosity; it’s a fully fledge museum with a sizable staff and a listing on most tourist maps of England.

.: Several friendly notices on wooden posts helpfully reminded us that we were still on public grounds, so there were no fears of farmers rushing off their porches toting shotguns and yelling, “Git yer ass off my land before I blast you!” or whatever the rural English equivalent is.

.: Eventually we emerged from the woods onto a road with no sidewalks. Another local passed us just in time to hear me demur, “I definitely don’t think this is where we’re supposed to be.”

“Where are you trying to go?” she offered.

“Down House.”

“Oh, it’s right here.”

.: She didn’t have vomit on her shirt or look like she was stumbling her way to or from a pub, so we decided she was trustworthy. We stepped across the road and ran into one more set of conflicting directions before finally entering Down House.

.: The museum required an entrance fee (understandable) and didn’t allow photography inside (grr), so I can’t quite remember much about the interior. I don’t get it. Pictures from Darwin’s house can’t possibly sell for much, and the natural lighting was acceptable for flash-less photography, so why the prohibition? When will museums the world over stop being dicks?

.: I learned a few interesting factoids from the audio guides. For instance, I didn’t know Darwin was a justice of the peace (these kind of things don’t make it into biology textbooks), and I found it interesting that Darwin could be so practical when it came to books: when studying a hefty science tome, he would often split the spine in half for easier reading.

.: Upstairs the house took on a more typical museum feel, with furniture replaced by informational murals. One of the more interesting rooms featured various criticisms from Darwin’s contemporaries. Oscar was astonished by how little the objections to evolution have changed over the years.

“And what good is half a wing?” was more novelly put — and just as easily refuted — back in the 19th century. Of course, that doesn’t stop smug creationists from asking it today, even after having the answer explained to them.

.: We exited the elevator — oh! but was Darwin ahead of his time — and went out back to the garden. Most people think of Darwin as a great theorist, a man of penetrating insight and ideas, but he was also an accomplished and meticulous experimentalist. His garden reflects this fact more than anything. (For more on the experimental Darwin, I strongly suggest Afarensis’s appropriately named series, The Experimental Darwin.)

.: The more childish element in me giggled when we walked past a plant specimen labeled “Urine Treatment.” Not because “Urine Treatment” is an inherently funny phrase (though it is), but because the thought crossed my mind that someone on the museum’s roster is responsible for replicating a century-old experiment by regularly urinating on potted plants.

.: At some point Oscar received a call from his mother, and I overheard this fragment: “Estoy en Down visitando la casa de Darwin . . . Charles Darwin . . . evolution guy . . . all right!” While on the phone with his madre he leaned up against a large tree, the roots of which blended seamlessly into the ground. He finished his conversation and looked up at the tree, then down at his shirt, alternating several times in excitement:

.: Could this be the same tree that inspired Darwin’s famous tree of life? Probably not, but it is a charming thought nonetheless.

.: Another feature of the garden is the Sandwalk, a 2-mile dirt path Darwin used for his daily constitutional. The Sandwalk closed thirty minutes before our arrival, but we defied the posted warnings and walked it anyway. We remain to this day unpunished.

.: We rounded the Sandwalk and headed back to London, finally passing through the proper entrance for the first time. Turns out a sharp curve in a road is enough to warrant a sign and new street name. Oscar’s initial intuition to follow the main road (with the terminating sidewalk) was correct.

.: The bus wasn’t going to arrive for another half hour, and we were hungry. We tried our luck at the Queen’s Head pub earlier when we were hopelessly lost. I wanted to order an apple pie at the time, but in England the chefs go home during non-peak hours, the lazy bastards. At the other pub we encountered two roisterous englishmen. Reconstructing their dialogue requires a fair amount of speculation, owing to a nearly indecipherable combination of rural English and insobriety. The following is my best effort from memory:

“He’s out back,” said the sitting man of the chef, “he’ll be back in a moment.”

“Nah he won’t.”

“Don’t listen to him, he’s drunk.”

“Nah I’m naught.”

“He’s a drunk.”

“I’m naught a drunk.”

“Don’t listen to him.”

.: I cannot tell you anymore, because we slowly backed out of the pub before the conclusion. We ordered two drinks at the Queen’s Head. England still hasn’t completely learned the many benefits of ice. Not only does it keep drinks cold, but it also gives the customer something to snack on when the drink is gone. And, from the business angle, ice takes up considerable volume. It’s simple logic: more ice = less drink. Less drink = less cost. It’s win-win.

.: Returning to London, we found an inviting pub and ordered Fish ‘n’ Chips. I was disappointed to learn they no longer serve Fish ‘n’ Chips in newspaper baskets. (Technically I didn’t learn it that night; Oscar told me before we landed. “It’s unsanitary, Cody.”) Here’s what arrived at our table:

.: And here’s how I compensated for the deficiency:

.: Much better!

Next: seeing Darwin’s statue in a cafe, seeing his grave in a famous abbey, and seeing a tourist attraction that felt like Disneyland without any rides.
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

.: We started our second day with a visit to the British Museum. Free of charge ever since it began in 1753, the British Museum has since amassed the world’s largest collection of statues with missing dangly bits. The museum itself impressed me more than any of the items it housed; it is simply gorgeous. I wish I were a Saudi prince so I could confidently approach an employee and coolly inquire, “Very nice. How much?” Then I would gut it, sell all the artifacts, and begin construction on an even larger building that would fully encase the original, making a museum of the museum. Admission would still be free, because a Saudi prince has no need for that kind of chump change.

.: My grandparents insisted I find the Code of Hammurabi and take a picture. They were certain they saw it when they visited in the seventies, but the reasoning behind their certainty is a little lacking. Their argument runs as follows: they stumbled upon a room full of Babylonian artifacts, and many of them mentioned Hammurabi or resembled the stele. They don’t exactly remember seeing The Code, but they looked at everything in the room. Ergo, they must have seen it.

.: We similarly found a distinctly Babylonian room, and I began the search for the famous Code. I studied the map of the museum Oscar purchased (£2) and easily found the locations for famous items like the Rosetta stone, Easter Island statues, and the five-legged Assyrian winged bulls, but I failed to find a listing for the Code. Oscar finally asked one of the guards, “Excuse me, where’s the Code of Hammurabi?” The friendly guard replied patiently, as if we just asked, “Where’s the Mona Lisa?”

“It’s in the Louvre, actually.”

.: So my grandparents watertight argument had one problem: the room they said had everything did not have everything.

.: Another laudable feature of the museum is its open camera policy. I understand why certain museums prohibit flash photography, but banning it all out just seems wrong for a museum to do. Sure, you could buy a professionally produced postcard from a gift shop, and it would certainly look better than your poorly framed shots, but that misses the point, doesn’t it? You could buy a professionally produced postcard without having to go to the museum, period. The point of photography for tourists is not so much to have pretty pictures to look at, but to serve as a reminder of where they’ve been. Thankfully, that wasn’t a problem at this museum, and as a result this post has more pictures than the others. Heck, it even has a video:

(YouTube is being wonky right now, I’ll edit the video in later.)

.: Arguably the most famous item at the British Museum is the Rosetta stone; it is constantly surrounded by an eager throng. You can forget about getting a decent shot of that one. Since everyone’s seen a picture of the Rosetta stone before, the only reason to see it in person is to appreciate its sheer size, and also so you’ll no longer be a liar when you tell your friends, “I’ve seen the Rosetta stone in person.” However, I’ve never seen the back of the Rosetta stone, picture or otherwise, and there weren’t many people standing on that side. Unfortunately, the public can’t be trusted not to steal the damn thing, so the stone is sealed inside what may be the most reflective glass ever created. With those caveats, please enjoy what, to many, will be your first view from the backside of the Rosetta stone.

.: One thing about the museum that irked me was the security theater you have to go through to get in – unless you’re not carrying a bag, that is. If that’s the case, you can just walk right on by. But if I can just walk right on by, why bother having the security checks in the first place? A guard waved me through with nothing but the briefest of glances, and I was clearly wearing cargo pants that had six spacious pockets. There are very few items that would fit in an average sized purse that wouldn’t fit in my pockets. What were they even searching for? They wouldn’t be concerned about cameras, since they’re allowed. If they were looking for bombs, what’s stopping two people from filling their cargo pants pockets with bomb components and assembling a bomb in a bathroom? I wanted to ask the guard that very question, but they tend to frown at suck inquiries. I didn’t even walk through a metal detector!

.: After the museum, we headed directly across the street to a Starbucks where I purchased a raspberry smoothie with my card. One of those quaint cultural differences I’ve encountered many times here is the tendency for British cashiers to actually check the signature on the backs of credit cards. I shocked the cashier the first time I handed over my VISA card. In a tone normally reserved for alerting fellow pedestrians that they are about to step foot in front of an oncoming bus he shrieked, “Your card’s not signed! Your card’s not signed!” Satisfied with having just saved a fellow human being the embarrassment of purchasing an item with an unsigned credit card, he then thrust the card back underneath the glass divider and stared at me, as if I were the stupidest person in the world. I contemplated the situation for the appropriate length of time, which is to say not at all, and immediately signed the back of the card and slid it underneath the glass divider again, as if he were the stupidest person in the world. He fell for it, I guess.

.: Somewhere between the Starbucks and the train station Oscar and I picked up some cold Oranginas. If you’ve never had an Orangina before, they’re pleasant little carbonated drinks with bits of orange pulp settled at the bottom. They aren’t readily available in America, but you can find them at a Whole Foods or Central Market. The brand enjoys a prominent advertising campaign throughout London that implores its customers to “Shake it to wake it.” I believe this is a moronically stupid ad campaign, because it does not take into consideration moronically stupid consumers like me who don’t know what happens to a carbonated drink when you shake it:

.: At least I finally found use for a certain section of the newspaper:

Next: Adventures in Down, for reals this time.
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six

.: Shortly after we lost Judy, Oscar and I emerged from the underground, and I saw my first real view of London up close. The unmistakable first impression I got was an intense craving for McDonalds, a sip of Budweiser chased down with Coke, all while talking on a digital Samsung handset. That’s because the moment we stepped out of the underground we were subjected to this.

.: Being in a train underground with no air conditioning for so long did not prepare me for the wholly pleasant experience of London’s summer weather, which is my very definition of perfect: cool breeze with shadow-less overcast.

.: We found our hotel. It’s cozy enough, and if Oscar weren’t sharing the room with me I’d feel it’d be big enough to live in comfortably.

.: I changed into street clothes, and I substituted eight hours of sleep with a quick shower (the showers here turn on at the push of a button!). I slipped into a light denim jacket that belonged to my grandmother. The weather didn’t demand a jacket, but wearing one didn’t make me uncomfortable either. I like to call such narrow perfection “Jacket Equilibrium”.

.: We went to a Sainsbury’s (pronounced “Sbrys”) to test our ATM and credit cards, and I bought an adorably clunky pint of milk and an unnaturally pickled pasta dish. I only picked the pasta because it had corn in it, and it didn’t look like I’d find that in much else (see picture below for further details).

.: The cashier at the in-store Starbucks (you have to pay extra to sit down?!) asked where we were from.

“Texas.”

“Houston or Dallas?”

.: I wanted to throw him off and say Paris, but he obviously didn’t speak English as a first language and would’ve most likely struggled to get the joke, which kinda sucked in the first place.

“Houston.”

“Okay, enjoy London.”

.: As of this writing, that’s the first and last time anyone’s expressed interest in our visitor’s status. Nobody’s said anything about our cute Texan accents or asked if we’re cowboys. I blame this indifference on the presence of all the other nationalities here, since their multicultural diversity has deadened the senses of ordinary Londoners and cheapened our arrival as a result. For comparison, when my grandparents visited in the 70’s, people would stay on elevators lifts up/down-boxes and purposefully miss their stops just to continue hearing them talk. True, neither Oscar nor I have much of a Texan accent to begin with (“bowl” has only one syllable for both of us), but come on, we’re different!

.: We went in and out of several shops and restaurants gave several shops and restaurants th’ ol’ in-out, in-out, and as happens naturally I soon had to relieve myself. The toilets at the mall cost £1 (U.S. equivalent: price of replacement engine for McLaren F1). I’m an American, so I don’t take lightly to infringements of my right to shit anywhere.

.: We found free restrooms at Harrod’s, and I stood in line. The attendant signaled me, the fourth person in line. I didn’t know what to make of it. I concentrated on the one stall I could see around the corner. He signaled me again, speaking this time. He used a combination of English and a language that has characters I’m fairly certain this browser can’t display. I didn’t understand anything he said, but the gesture was pretty obvious this time. I cut in front of the three guys in front of me and rounded the corner only to realize too late that there was only one stall, still occupied. The two empty urinals clearly were what the attendant had in mind.

.: I figured I could kill at least one bird with this stone. I had to pee fairly urgently; the rest could wait. I approached the urinal and not a damn thing came out. I felt like a giant panda at a Chinese zoo – I can’t perform when I’m being watched. I don’t care if psychology doesn’t recognize “piss shivers” as a legitimate condition. I can’t use a urinal when other people are watching.

.: So I left, humiliated, defeated, and still badly in the need of a pee. Harrod’s may not have gotten my dime, but they did get a small part of my dignity. They almost got a part of Oscar’s dignity as well, who seriously considered purchasing a £15 hot dog. In U.S. terms, this is equivalent to fifteen $15 hot dogs.

Next: A museum old enough to be exhibited in another museum, and getting lost in Down
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four | Part Five | Part Six